Turkish Press Review
Turkish dailies mainly covered the death of veteran journalist Cetin Altan on Friday
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Turkish journalist Cetin Altan’s death dominated the front pages of most Turkish dailies on Friday.
Altan, who was also a prominent figure in Turkish politics, died of a respiratory failure on Thursday at a hospital in Istanbul.
He was a deputy between 1965 and 1969 for the left-wing Workers Party of Turkey -- the first socialist party in the country to gain representation in the country's national parliament. He was also sentenced to prison several times on charges of spreading communist propaganda in his articles.
“Farewell,” was MILLIYET’s headline. Reporting about the life of the 88-year-old veteran columnist, MILLIYET wrote that Altan had to fight against detentions, prison sentences and lynching attempts throughout his life.
“He left without seeing democracy,” was CUMHURIYET’s headline, adding that Altan celebrated his last birthday on June 22.
“The country I dreamed of leaving for my grandchildren is not this one,” the daily wrote quoting one of Altan’s last lines from his columns on its front page.
Quoting the same sentences HURRIYET ran the headline: “We lost Cetin Altan”.
“The ‘lord of the words’ has gone,” was VATAN’s headline, while AKSAM wrote, “Veteran journalist lost his life”.
During his career, Altan had been a vocal critic, writing a number of controversial columns for many Turkish dailies, including the Hurriyet, Milliyet, Aksam and Sabah.
He also wrote several novels such as "The Great Surveillance" (1972) and "Whisky" (1975), as well as poems, plays such as "Criminals" (1965) and non-fiction works such as "Social beliefs of Ataturk" (1965).
In other news, HABERTURK ran a story investigating ties between perpetrators of the Ankara blast that killed 102 people at a peace rally on Oct. 10, and their alleged connection with a Daesh structure in Turkey’s southeastern province of Gaziantep.
One of the suicide bombers was officially identified as Yunus Emre Alagoz. Investigators were still said to be attempting to identify the second bomber.
HABERTURK claimed that an organizer of Ankara’s twin blasts paid 2,500 Turkish liras [$ 872] to a driver who drove two suspects to the Turkish capital on Oct. 10. Citing police sources, the daily claimed that the money was brought to Turkey by Daesh militants from Syria.
